


For the Thrill of It All

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Dirty Sexy Money
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-20
Updated: 2008-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-25 07:21:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1638656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I think your family has given me quite enough actual work to do already without trying to turn a princess back into a frog."</p>
            </blockquote>





	For the Thrill of It All

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Nina

 

 

There was a long and varied list of things that Daisy thought were appropriate to leave on Nick's desk in the mornings. She seemed to believe that if something was put in his personal space, it would automatically demand his attention, so he had learned quickly to be a little wary approaching his workspace when he got into his office. It was a Tuesday morning in December when he discovered that a pair of size seven Manolo Blahniks were apparently an acceptable addition to this list.

"Nick George!" Juliet said, beaming at him over a cup of coffee. She held it out invitingly. "Just the man I wanted to see. I need you to give me a lesson."

"Oh," Daisy said, sticking her head through the door. "And Juliet Darling's in your office."

"Thank you, Daisy," he said dryly. "A lesson?" he asked Juliet as Daisy retreated back to her desk. "In what, manners?" He swatted at her feet with a file folder until she put them back on the floor.

She put the coffee into the space her shoes had vacated. "Kind of," she said. "I need to know how to be a person."

He gave her a look. "Two legs, a couple of hands, a voice that appears to be making at least vaguely coherent sentences...looks like you've already got that down."

She crossed her arms and pouted at him. "No, I mean a _person_. Like, someone..." she waved her hands around his office.

"Normal?" he finished.

"I was going for poor," she said. "But normal's close enough."

"And what makes you think I'm qualified to do that?" he asked, finally reaching over and taking the cup. If he was going to have to have this conversation so early in the morning, he might as well be caffeinated.

She shrugged and shuffled the papers around on his desk. "You're the only normal person I know."

"Daisy has a system there, you know," he told her. "And no I'm not."

"Okay, you're the only normal person I know who might possibly _care_ enough about my social well-being to do anything about it."

"I'm not giving you person lessons, Juliet. I think your family has given me quite enough actual work to do already without trying to turn a princess back into a frog."

She frowned. "What's the opposite of kissing, anyway?" She stared off into the distance for a moment, then shook her head. "Never mind, don't answer that. Look, all I'm asking for is one day, okay? Just...take me around, show me what people do when they can't spend their time spending money."

"They _work_ ," Nick reminded her. "I'm sure if you're really interested, Daisy would be happy to take the day off and let you run the office."

"No she wouldn't!" Daisy called through the door. 

Juliet sighed deeply. "Nick, if I don't know how to interact like everybody else, no one is _ever_ going to love me, and I'm going to die a sad old spinster who only ever clings to her overworked and underpaid lawyer for comfort, companionship, and other things that start with C. You _really_ don't want to be that lawyer."

"Was that actually a threat?" Nick asked. He took a sip of the coffee, grimaced, and put it back on the desk. "...because it was really kind of effective."

Juliet beamed and jumped up, linking their arms together. "Where to, oh normal one?"

"You know, you could have just googled 'cheap things to do in New York' and saved everyone a lot of trouble," Nick said as she steered them towards the door.

"I could have, but where's the fun in that?" she asked, and waved at Daisy on their way out the door.

"Okay," Nick said when they reached the curb. "Get us a cab."

Juliet stared at him blankly. "I'm sorry?"

"A cab. One of those yellow things going by on the street."

"I refuse to believe that if a perfectly normal girl went out for the day with a perfectly normal guy, he'd make her hail her own cab. Did chivalry die while I wasn't looking?"

"Yes," he told her, "but if it makes you feel better, just pretend I've broken my arms or something. I'm completely incapable of getting the attention of any cab. So it's up to the perfectly normal woman I'm with to save the day."

She sighed deeply. "I knew I should have asked Clark instead," she said, but waved theatrically at the street.

"Plus," Nick added as a cab screeched up to the curb, splashing a puddle onto their feet, "cabs are much more likely to stop for attractive young women than for guys like me."

"That's true," the cab driver agreed as they slid into the back seat. "But I have no respect for any man who will make a woman hail her own cab."

Juliet smirked smugly out the window at the streets that rolled by.

"Really?" Nick asked after they had left the cab and its driver behind. "What kind of kid doesn't go ice skating when they're little?" 

"A Darling," Juliet told him succinctly, peeking over his shoulder as he paid for the skate rental. "Didn't you want me to do that?"

"I thought you were being normal today," Nick reminded her. "I'll bill you for it tomorrow when you're back to being you." He handed over a pair of skates.

"No, look, you have to tie them tighter," he told her as she tugged ineffectually at the laces. "Do it like that and you'll break your ankle. I'm pretty sure I'd get fired if I brought you home with a broken ankle."

"Oh please," Juliet said, "like Daddy would _ever_ fire you." But she let him tighten the skates for her, only wincing a little. She tucked her shoes away into her bag and sat tapping her blades against the ground while Nick put his own skates on. "Anyway, it's not like none of us ever skated," she told him. "Patrick played hockey for a few weeks, but then the tabloids got a picture of him coming home with a split lip."

"I'll bet your mother loved that," he said.

"It was pretty much the end of any of us doing sports," she agreed. "Except dance. I danced when I was little, you know."

"I know," Nick told her. "I've seen the pictures." He offered her a hand up, and she wobbled to her feet, grabbing at his coat to keep her balance. 

"When I said 'real people,' I didn't actually mean 'tourists,'" she told him as she stepped onto the ice, eyeing a fast-moving pack of little kids warily.

"I know," he said, "but you're experiencing New York on a budget for the first--and probably only--time. It's like you _are_ a tourist. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, Juliet Darling. Make the most of it." He waved up at the people with cameras around the edges of the rink. "Chances are, once your mother sees a picture of this, it's going to be Patrick and his hockey career all over again."

Juliet beamed. "Then I guess I'll just have to put on a show," she said, and executed a successful, if slightly shaky, twirl.

"Impressive," Nick said, and in honor of her achievement he only laughed a very little when she wiped out spectacularly a lap and a half later.

"What's next?" she demanded when they got off the ice, her cheeks red with the cold and the exercise, eyes sparkling as she peered up at the enormous tree while they walked. 

Next was a trip to a museum--at which Juliet was not allowed to buy anything for the Imperial--a walk through the park, dinner at a tiny bistro neither of them had ever heard of. Each step of the way, Nick took calls from the Darlings, from Lisa, from Kiki, from Simon, and Daisy, and journalists (who all received a "no comment" and a hangup), and each call seemed to make Juliet even more determined to act like someone who wasn't a part of that world at all.

"You've cured me!" she declared as they walked out of the restaurant. She stole his phone out of his pocket and dialed, then repeated "He's cured me!" into it. "I'm a real girl!"

"Congratulations, Pinocchio," Jeremy's voice said tinnily through the receiver. "Just remember that he's a lawyer. There are _always_ strings."

"You're just jealous that I'm going to be able to find real love and you never will," Juliet said loftily.

"Yes, I'm going to die sad and alone, surrounded by nothing but cats. And by cats, I mean--"

Juliet hung up on him before he could finish telling her exactly what he meant, and Nick took his phone back, grabbing her sleeve as she went to hail a cab. "Sorry, no," he said. "You want to live like a real person, you're getting back home the old fashioned way."

"It's really inhumane," she told him a few minutes later, face pressed up against the collar of his coat as the subway rattled back towards the Imperial. "Isn't it unsafe, all these people in one place? What if we broke down? What if we _exploded_?"

"Yeah, I wouldn't say you're cured just yet, exactly," Nick said, rolling his eyes over her head at the other passengers.

It was snowing when they left the subway station, and Juliet stopped for a moment, looking up at the flakes falling between the buildings. "Maria said the other day that all little girls want Santa to make them into princesses for Christmas," she said. "Do you think that's true?"

Nick laughed. "Probably not. But what do I know? I wanted Santa to make me into a superhero."

"And look at you now," Juliet said, laughing and doing a little spin under the snow.

Nick smiled ruefully. "Yeah," he agreed. "Look at me now."

"Know what I always asked for?" Juliet asked.

"I don't, but I bet that Santa looked at his list every year, saw your name, and asked his elves 'what the hell do I get for the girl who has everything?'"

"All the other little girls were wishing to be princesses," Juliet said. "I was wishing not to be."

"Well then, just call me Santa," Nick said as they reached the steps of the Imperial. "Juliet Darling, you have just spent your first day as a non-princess. Congratulations."

"Well then, as my first act as non-princess, I dub thee, Nick George, my non-knight in slightly snow-covered armor." She dusted off his shoulders and beamed at him, then swept in to kiss his cheek. "How long do you think it'll take for my family to notice that I've been replaced by a frog?" she asked.

"Only one way to find out," Nick said. 

He was in a cab on the way home when his phone buzzed in his pocket. He read the text, then put the phone away, still seeing the words reflected in the window as the city lights passed him by.

_How long do you think it'll take for me to notice that I really haven't?_

 


End file.
